Enzmann Starship Art

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Aug 292010

I scanned in the cover of my best copy of the October 1973 issue of “Analog” science fiction  magazine (art by Rick Sternbach) and tinkered with it. Got rid of the text, cleaned up scuffmarks and the like, and generally tried to improve the appearance of the art as much as possible. Given the low-rez printing and the small physical dimensions of Analog, there’s only so much that can be done. 

It’s a hell of a piece of art; I’d love to see a full-sized high-rez print of it. But I suspect the original art, once sent to Analog, either got tossed or lost. But you never know…

enzmann4.jpg

Posted by admin at 1:16 am
  • Pat Flannery

    I never could figure out what was going on with the color of the Deuterium tank. Is it supposed to by glossy black, or is it chrome silver and reflecting the blackness of space?

  • admin

    The “tank” was supposed to be a thin plastic bubble, inflated into a sphere, then plasma-coated with metal. So that in the end you’d have a seamless, perfectly smooth metal bubble. Thus, mirror-surfaced.

  • sferrin

    So much good stuff out there lost forever. :-(

  • Pat Flannery

    Yeah, that was a very memorable painting.
    There’s an archive of all the Astounding/Analog cover artwork from 1930 forwards by year here:
    http://www.sfcovers.net/Magazines/ASF/navbar.htm

  • Pat Flannery

    Look, Daedalus by Rick Sternbach from 1976:
    http://www.sfcovers.net/Magazines/ASF/ASF_0548.jpg
    And another Enzmann illustration by Eggleton from 1995:
    http://www.sfcovers.net/Magazines/ASF/ASF_0794.jpg

  • http://ricksternbach.com Rick Sternbach

    Well, you never know until you ask. Fortunately, Analog was very good about returning artwork to their artists, even back in the 70s when some publishers weren’t nearly so professional. Larry Niven bought the original and had it nicely framed.

  • admin

    > Larry Niven bought the original

    Great! I’ve been meaning to try to get in touch with Niven (& Pournelle) regarding Archangel Michael. I have the Aldo Spadoni artwork that was created for a book project (“The Ships of Known Space,” or something like that), but I spoke very briefly to Pournelle at a sci-fi con in San Jose years ago, and he seemed to indicate that the Spadoni design wasn’t entirely accurate.

    For those sci-fi authors who’ve written about Orions clearly enough that an attempt at illustration will be made, attempts to contact them and get their input will also be made. Like here: http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=186

  • Pat Flannery

    Another ship Niven would be fun to talk to about is the MacArthur, which Rick Sternbach also illustrated:
    http://meinekleinefabrik.blogspot.com/2007/09/little-spaceship-that-could.html
    Someone did another version of that that showed up on Starship Modeler several years back:
    http://www.starshipmodeler.net/contest4/ss_s15.htm
    The MIGE one I always wanted to model was the battleship Lenin.

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